New pipeline to provide Jordan with alternative water supply.
The arid Middle East is feeling the dehydrated pinch of a prolonged deficit and Jordan, the region’s most water-stressed country, is in a more perilous position than most. Renewable water resources per capita have declined dramatically over a single generation, and by 2025 will have dwindled to half their current level. Five successive years of below-average rainfall have compounded the country’s water stress, fuelling fears that the worst is yet to come when man-made climate change bites.
The Disi-Mudawarra water supply scheme is going some way to easing the water woes of Amman, the Jordanian capital, where household taps are currently unable to provide water around the clock. Halcrow has been involved in the £640 million project for ten years, and is now seeing the tangible results of its input take shape.
Under the build, operate, transfer (BOT) project, a 325km-long pipeline will pump water extracted from the ancient Disi aquifer in the southern region of Mudawarra to Amman, providing 100 million m³ per year – a third of the capital’s annual requirements – by 2013. Forecasters estimate the non-renewable resource will viably generate water for at least 50 years.
In its role as owner’s engineer to project company DIWACO, Halcrow is responsible for reviewing the engineering procurement and construction (EPC) contractor’s designs and documents. The team is also providing construction supervision services, along with specialist technical, quality control and assurance advice.